Four New Rochelle Municipal Housing Authority (NRMHA) Commissioners have sued the City to challenge their December 29, 2022, dismissals by former City Manager Chuck Strome just two days before his retirement.

In the suit, filed in New York State Supreme Court in White Plains, the Commissioners argue their removal by Strome was “arbitrary and capricious” and violated “their statutory rights to due process of law.” 

The suit also helps make clear the Commissioners’ removal was politically motivated to prevent them from pursuing their redevelopment plan for the NRMHA’s Bracey Houses. 

In her affidavit, former NRMHA Chair Sheila Small states the Commissioners were unlawfully terminated, “in response to the Board’s ongoing objection to the City’s larger political agenda of redeveloping areas surrounding and including the Bracey Project.” 

The Commissioners seek to get the court to order current City Manager Kathleen Gill to reverse Strome’s decision and to give them “an opportunity to be heard in person or by counsel in their own defense, at a public hearing,” according to court papers.

The suit was filed after the City cut off communication with the Commissioners who were seeking to resolve their case without having to go to court.

County Legislator, and candidate for Mayor, Damon Maher, brought the suit to light at City Council’s Citizens to Be Heard on Tuesday, June 13. “The papers are public record,” he said. “I have read them. It is clear they were unjustly terminated.” 

Maher pointed out that, “The former Board believes its demise began when it refused to consent to the construction of a Starbucks drive-thru abutting Bracey and supportive housing in violation of a city ordinance prohibiting drive-thrus in residential neighborhoods.” 

He continued, “The City seems intent on delaying and not sitting down with attorneys to settle the manner. Would the City rather proceed with the lawsuit with the expense to both sides, one side being us, the taxpayers? Will the City use delay tactics to avoid a resolution until after the primaries for mayor and council seats?  What does the City have to hide?”

Maher added, “The Commissioners’ dismissal was wrong. They must be given the opportunity to rejoin the Board, should they choose to do so, in order to continue the vital work they were doing to support the 100 families living at Bracey Houses. I support equity-based development at Bracey. The residents deserve that.” 

Community activist Lisa Burton also addressed the Board’s removal at the City Council meeting. She said, “The Board worked diligently to try to find a way in which the last remaining public housing in New Rochelle could be sustainable, could be broadened, that the number of people on that footprint could be expanded by a public-private partnership, and where the residents had ownership.” 

Burton continued, “It was an innovative program. It was shown to the Development Department, and then 17 days before they were about to move forward and vote on it, they get dismissed. This is something that we should be concerned about.”

Several other people read into the record portions of an affidavit prepared by James Stockard that was included in the suit. Stockard is affiliated with the department of Urban Planning and Design at the Harvard Graduate School of Design and has more than 50 years of experience with public housing and with the procedures and practices of the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) which oversees housing authorities nationwide.

Addressing Strome’s decision to dismiss the Board based on a December 21 letter he received from HUD Regional Director Luigi D’Ancona, Stockard said, “I have never seen a single instance of a HUD Director of Public Housing writing to a Chief Executive Officer of a City suggesting he review the appointments to the existing Municipal Housing Authority Board and make changes that may result in the removal of Board Members lawfully serving on that Board.”

Stockard went on to say, “with regard to the alleged financial issues raised in the D’Ancona letter, it is clear those were the responsibilities of the City, its Chief Financial Officer, the staff and financial professionals hired at the behest of the City of New Rochelle. It is the Board’s responsibility to make policy, not to run the daily activities of the agency. Both HUD and the City Manager ignore this.” 

When the suit was filed on May 1, the City had until June 15 to answer the charges. Instead, they sought, and received, a 30-day extension to file their papers, now due July 10, after the conclusion of the primaries for Mayor and City Council.